Page 26 of Beauty and the Daddy

Ineed another shower. I let the water wash over me.

Every time I close my eyes, I see those bloody knuckles and wonder how I can possibly be attracted to someone who just turned a man's face into ground beef.

What does that say about me? Normal women swipe right on accountants named Dave who collect vintage Star Wars figurines, not men who collect other men's teeth as trophies.

"What the actual fuck, Belle?" I turn off the shower and slap my head against the wall.

I step out of the steam like I'm breaking surface after a long, stupid dive—lungs tight, skin flushed, brain still buzzing with Luca running in circles around it.

I wrap a towel around myself.

On one hand: God damn, that was terrifying.

On the other hand, he beat the shit out of that guy because the idiot disrespected me.

Which is... sweet? In a deeply disturbed, call-your-therapist kind of way.

I pad back into the bedroom, leaving wet footprints on the marble floor, and freeze.

There's a black velvet box sitting on my bed like a grenade with the pin pulled.

I know what's in there before I even touch it. Every woman knows that particular size of impending doom.

It's sitting on my pillow, right where his head was last night, right where he made me scream his name until my voice broke.

The placement isn't accidental. Nothing Luca does is accidental.

My stomach drops. Not in a cute rollercoaster way—in adid the floor just vanishway.

My heart stutters like it's forgotten how to beat properly. I know what that is. Everyone knows what that is.

"No way," I whisper, approaching the bed like the box might bite. "No fucking way."

Up close, the box isn't cute. It's monstrous.

Heavy in my hands like it has its own gravitational field. There's no card. No note.

Just a discreet embossed crest on the lid.

Yeah. Okay. Cool. Please tell me this isn't what I think it is.

I flip open the lid and nearly drop the damn thing.

This isn't a ring. This is a statement.

The diamond is obscene, an oval cut that could fund a small country's healthcare system.

It doesn't just catch light; it hoards it, then weaponizes it. This isn't jewelry. It's a declaration of war against subtlety.

It's the kind of ring that requires its own bodyguard and insurance policy. Four carats, minimum.

"What the hell?" I breathe, unable to tear my eyes away from it.

I should shut the box. I should put it under the bed and then punt myself to a new country.

Instead, my traitor hand lifts the ring out. The band slides against my wet fingertip as if it's been waiting for me my whole dumb life.

No. I don't. I won't?—